


Glimmer in the Darkness

by EllieL



Category: A Discovery of Witches (TV), All Souls Trilogy - Deborah Harkness
Genre: Angst, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Missing Scene, The Book of Life - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-24
Updated: 2018-10-24
Packaged: 2019-08-07 02:12:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16399436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EllieL/pseuds/EllieL
Summary: Set during The Book of Life, post-Chelm***His head fell in a barely perceptible nod, as he decided to allow his bright fierce witchy wife to return the protection he’d given so freely to her, and allow her to help and protect him, just this once.





	Glimmer in the Darkness

 

His heart gave one lurching thud against his chest as panic swept through him. He had not needed to sleep this much in centuries, so it was disconcerting to awaken alone in the darkness, confused and further panicked by the cool silence that surrounded him. Damaged limbs thrashed, trying to free themselves from whatever had entangled him, sending daggers of pain through his body.

 

Gradually, he realized they were sheets. Soft, clean sheets. He’d managed to raise himself to a seated position, on a cozy bed. He stilled, mind whirling, trying to reorient himself. Still-mending ribs would not allow a truly deep breath, but he inhaled, slowly, repeated, tried to allow the scents to linger. _Diana_ , he realized, in the bedding all around him.

 

The door swung open, rasp of the latch the only sound warning him of the intrusion. Every sore muscle in his body tensed again, only to relax at the pad of bare feet and a pale _chatoiement_ moving towards him. It had changed since he’d left her, the general gleam replaced instead with a rippling glow, glimmering not just with long forgotten scripts but also a new confidence in herself. She had embraced, finally, her own talents.

 

Without a word, she settled onto the bed next to him, sweet, reassuring scent surrounding him, warm hip next to his cold, aching thigh. One hand riffled through his hair, light as a hummingbird, as her lips just grazed his temple. Gentler than anyone had been with him in so very long, gentler than he deserved, after everything he’d done.

 

“Matthew.” It was barely a whisper, just a warm breath against him, and he breathed as deeply of her as he dared, willing warring emotions within him to settle. “Can I use a little magic?”

 

He pulled away more sharply than he should have. “Don’t look,” he rasped, not wanting her kiss to reveal to her everything he’d experienced in Benjamin’s captivity--the piles of children, the pain of injuries only a vampire could have survived, the knowledge of what had been done to Phillippe. He knew she must have seen some of the video feed, must know at least some of what he wanted to shield her from, but feeling it as he had was not something he ever wanted her to experience. Fifteen centuries of experience with violence and death, and he had barely survived it.

 

“No, not until you’re ready to share,” she responded, drawing her hand through his hair again, one of the few things she could do without touching somewhere he’d been harmed. “Just a simple spell, to help you rest without bad dreams. I can try to help with the physical pain a little, too.”

 

In the dark, he knew his face was hidden from her, and bought him a few seconds to consider his response before she’d begin to second guess her offer. He’d never been a good patient, had never liked anyone else to see him wounded or need to aid him. He’d sewn his own damned leg back together after Poitiers and rode home without a word of complaint. But times had changed, s _he_ had changed him. But she also knew what a tremendous ask this ceding of control was, given how tenuous his sense of control was.

 

His head fell in a barely perceptible nod, as he decided to allow his bright fierce witchy wife to return the protection he’d given so freely to her, and allow her to help and protect him, just this once. “Yes,” barely an exhalation. “Please.”

 

“Thank you, my love.” Her lips brushed his temple again, gentle, soothing. She understood. “Is anywhere that’s especially painful tonight? Is there anything else you need?”

 

There was most definitely something he wanted, so badly it had been threatening to overwhelm him for days. It would be so easy to taste her, to take her up on her delicate offer. To lose himself in the feeling of comfort and love he knew awaited him. But he did not trust himself with her, not yet, not so soon. Instead, “Ribs. Breathing hurts.” Everything hurt, he wanted to sob.

 

“All right.  Here,” she shifted on the bed, flicked a wrist in the sheets and downy comforter, both filling the air with her warm scent and righting the tangle he’d made in his panic. “Can you lay back down?”

 

He was fairly sure her magic was assisting him, even as he refused her physical support and slid somewhat awkwardly down onto his back. Joints that should have shrieked in protest merely groaned, and he sighed as she tucked the warm bedding carefully around him.

 

“You can be a maddeningly hard-headed creature, Matthew Clairmont.” Her lips brushed his, so faintly that it might have been a puff of air.

 

Whatever spell she wove required no further words, only the bright glimmer of her fingers, words and scripts flickering across her bare forearms. In moments, he was able to take a deeper breath, almost filling his lungs for the first time in a week. He could smell her, smell their children next door, smell _home_. That alone was enough to make him feel better, less panicked, and the gradual easing of tension in his muscles and the terrible ache in his hands only compounded the relief.

 

“ _Merci, mon coeur_.” He wished he could touch her, trace the ouroboros at her wrist, run his fingers across the Greek characters that had twinkled along her arm, tangle his fingers in her hair along with the branches of the tree of life that flourished there.

 

“Rest. Recover. Let someone who loves you take care of you, just for a little while.”  She slipped under the blankets next to him, warm and comforting, whispering a few simple words so softly that even he could barely hear them.

 

The last thing he saw before drifting off to sleep was the reassuring glimmer of her, just beside him, close enough that it touched him, too.


End file.
